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Showing posts from October, 2013

Fates Warning - Darkness in a Different Light

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Fates Warning is a band that's been around for lots of years. They've released great albums in the past and, thankfully, after a long silence they've released Darkness in a Different Light, demonstrating again that they're an excellent progressive metal. The best thing in the album is that every song is memorable. The riffs are dark and heavy but perfectly balanced with clean melodic guitar lines. Acoustic guitars are used wisely. Also, Fates Warning manages to create progressive metal that is concise and to the point. Even the fourteen minute closing track feels like it has been well trimmed.  The album opens with One Thousand Fires, hands down one of the highlights of an incredibly solid album. Other, personal, highlights include Into the Black and the epic Yet It Moves. But every song here is excellent. I can't say that it's their best album. I don't want to get into that kind of argument but I'll certainly say that this is my favourit

Covenant - Leaving Babylon (2013)

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Originating from Sweden, Covenant have been around since the early 90s. Leaving Babylon is their eighth album and despite its ups and downs there's certainly a lot to like here. The album opens with the title track Leaving Babylon, which is a repetitive and hypnotic song. It's a decent song that walks you into the album and acts as an intro. The second track, Prime Movers, leaves the introduction behind and suddenly the album comes to live. From then on, the album has its ups and downs but generally delivers excellent beats and melodies.  Prime Movers and Four Our Time are great examples of simple, hypnotic and fascinating future-pop. There's a little harshness to the beats but a very gentle and mellow side to the music that creates a perfect balance to the songs.  But the two standout songs of the album are Ignorance and Bliss and Last Dance. Both of them are really powerful songs that manage to combine classic and retro synth sounds with very solid

Alter Bridge - Fortress (2013)

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Fortress is darker and heavier than their previous efforts but still remains true to the Alter Bridge sound. The band has released good albums before and, although I'm sure some will not agree, this time they've nailed a perfect album.  There isn't much to say about it. This is a perfect hard rock, heavy metal album. Powerful riffs, memorable choruses, excellent guitar solos and outstanding vocals that show a big and emotive range. The songs tap into the classic style of the genre whilst still sounding contemporary and new. In many ways it feels like the band knew they had nothing else to prove and couldn't care less about conforming to musical styles; alternative rock, hard rock, metal, whatever! The only criticism (if that) is that the album is too consistently good and no songs stand out. In fact, Cry of Achilles is such an incredible song that nothing else tops it. The album doesn't get better but it doesn't get worse either. Every single song here is